Three of the 15 Gator engineers who won National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships this year are from the University of Florida’s Department of Materials Science & Engineering/Nuclear Engineering.
The Graduate Research Fellowship Program, known as GRFP, provides three years of financial support over five years to graduate students who have demonstrated potential for significant research achievements. Since 1952, GRFP has supported over 70,000 graduate research fellows. More than 40 former fellows have received Nobel Prizes, according to NSF.
Adriana Isabelle LaVopa
Alumna
Adriana Isabelle LaVopa graduated from MSE this spring with her bachelor’s degree; she minored in linguistics. This fall, she will start as a materials science and engineering doctoral student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. At UF, she worked with Yeongseon Jang, Ph.D., an assistant professor in chemical engineering, to develop protein-based artificial cells
Rachel Rigsby
Ph.D. Student
Rachel Rigsby is a doctoral student in Nuclear Engineering and expects to graduate in the spring of 2029. She earned her bachelor’s degree in chemistry in 2024 from the University of North Alabama. In addition to becoming an NSF Graduate Research Fellow, Rigsby recently became a fellow of the Rickover Fellowship Program. That program is sponsored by the Naval Reactors Division of the U.S. Department of Energy. Rigsby is advised by Yong Yang, Ph.D., an MSE associate professor.
Jenny Xue
Alumna
Jenny Xue earned her bachelor’s degree in Materials Science and Engineering from UF in May. During her time at UF, she conducted research on thin-film solar cells and 2D materials for flexible electronics in the labs of Jiangeng Xue, Ph.D., and Philip Feng, Ph.D. In the Fall, Jenny will pursue her Ph.D. in materials science and engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, studying electronic materials for quantum networks.